What's the next 'gold mine' for PCs? Rory Head, the CEO of ADM (Advanced Micro Devices, the n. 2 of the chip industry, behind Intel) has no doubts: the Chinese hinterland, the rural interior regions and small cities of China, where hundreds live of millions of people who have yet to cross the digital divide, that ridge that separates netizens from citizens, the inhabitants of the web from the inhabitants tout court. “The next billion PC customers will come from emerging countries, and especially China,” says Mr. Head.
Indeed, the IT industry has reached an inflection point in China, with the emergence of cloud computing and the government initiative to integrate the Internet, television and communications: a pilot project for 12 cities (an average of 5 million inhabitants each, but also including smaller towns, such as Zhuzhou in Hunan and Mianyang in Sichuan) was approved last year, and AMD, which already has 2500 employees in China and strong ties with local PC firms (Lenovo and others) intends to ride this attack on the digital divide.
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/business/company-focus/2011/12/20/326426/AMD-sees.htm
